Standing Committee G

[Mrs. Irene Adams in the Chair]

Education Bill

Motion made, and Question proposed, 
That—
 (1) during proceedings on the Education Bill the Standing Committee do meet when the House is sitting on Tuesdays at half-past Ten o'clock and half-past Four o'clock and on Thursdays at five minutes to Ten o'clock and half-past Two o'clock;
 (2) 18 sittings in all shall be allotted to the consideration of the Bill by the Committee;
 (3) the proceedings to be taken on the sittings shall be as shown in the second column of the Table below and shall be taken in the order so shown;
 (4) the proceedings which under paragraph (3) are to be taken on any sitting shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the time specified in the third column of the Table;
 (5) paragraph (3) does not prevent proceedings being taken (in the order shown in the second column of the Table) on any earlier sitting than that provided for under paragraph (3) if all previous proceedings have already been concluded.

TABLE SittingProceedingsTime for conclusion of proceedings 1st Clauses 1 to 12 — 2nd Clauses 1 to 12 (so far as not previously concluded) — 3rd Clauses 1 to 12 (so far as not previously concluded) 11.25 a.m. 4th Clauses 13 to 18, Schedule 1, Clauses 19 to 35, Schedule 2, Clauses 36 to 38, Schedule 3, Clauses 39 to 43 —  5th Clauses 13 to 18, Schedule 1, Clauses 19 to 35, Schedule 2, Clauses 36 to 38, Schedule 3, Clauses 39 to 43 (so far as not previously concluded) —  6th Clauses 13 to 18, Schedule 1, Clauses 19 to 35, Schedule 2, Clauses 36 to 38, Schedule 3, Clauses 39 to 43 (so far as not previously concluded) 7 p.m.  7th Clauses 44 to 48, Schedule 4, Clause 49, Clause 50 1 p.m. 8th Clauses 51 to 53, Schedule 5, Clauses 54 to 56, Schedule 6, Clauses 57 to 61 — 9th Clauses 51 to 53, Schedule 5, Clauses 54 to 56, Schedule 6, Clauses 57 to 61 (so far as not previously concluded) 11.25 a.m.  10th Clauses 62 to 65, Schedule 7, Clause 66, Clause 67, Schedule 8, Clause 68, Schedule 9, Clauses 69 to 71, Schedule 10 —  11th Clauses 62 to 65, Schedule 7, Clause 66, Clause 67, Schedule 8, Clause 68, Schedule 9, Clauses 69 to 71, Schedule 10 (so far as not previously concluded) 1 p.m.  12th Clause 72, Clause 93, Clause 73, Clause 94, Clauses 74 to 76, Clauses 95 to 97, Clause 77, Clause 79, Clause 98, Clause 100, Clause 85, Clause 106, Clause 78, Clause 99, Clause 80, Clause 101, Clause 81, Clause 82, Clause 102, Clause 103, Clause 83, Clause 84, Clause 104, Clause 105, Clauses 86 to 91, Clauses 107 to 112, Clause 92, Clause 113, Clause 114 7 p.m.  13th Clauses 115 to 126, Schedule 12, Clauses 127 to 144, Schedule 13 —  14th Clauses 115 to 126, Schedule 12, Clauses 127 to 144, Schedule 13 (so far as not previously concluded) 5 p.m. 15th Clauses 145 to 148, Schedule 14, Clauses 149 to 151, Schedule 15, Clauses 152 to 170 — 16th Clauses 145 to 148, Schedule 14, Clauses 149 to 151, Schedule 15, Clauses 152 to 170 (so far as not previously concluded) 7 p.m. 17th Clauses 171 to 181, Schedule 16, Clause 182, Schedule 17, Clause 183, Schedule 18, Clauses 184 to 189, Schedule 11, Clauses 190 to 193, Schedule 19, Clauses 194 to 200, Schedule 20, Clauses 201 to 211, Schedule 21, Schedule 22, new Clauses, new Schedules — 18th Clauses 171 to 181, Schedule 16, Clause 182, Schedule 17, Clause 183, Schedule 18, Clauses 184 to 189, Schedule 11, Clauses 190 to 193, Schedule 19, Clauses 194 to 200, Schedule 20, Clauses 201 to 211, Schedule 21, Schedule 22, new Clauses, new Schedules (so far as not previously concluded)-[Mr. Timms.] 5 p.m.

Mr. Graham Brady 
 (Altrincham and Sale, West): I should like to make a few comments on the programme motion. I stress the Opposition's overall support for the broad aims of the Bill to stimulate more innovation and to explore new ways of improving education and skills standards. However, we have great reservations about the Bill's approach to its aims. Foremost among these is the scale of the Henry VIII clause, which appears early in the Bill. 
jf1ÝI am pleased to see you in the Chair, Mrs. Adams. I know that we will have an opportunity to explore matters properly and fully, as Members of the House and the public expect us to. In that context, I welcome you to the Chair.
 I am assessing the programme motion with respect to the scope of the Bill, which seeks to accrue enormous powers for the Secretary of State. So much is done through his discretion. I draw the Committee's attention to the power to suspend statutory requirements in clause 2(1)(a): 
''conferring on the applicant exemption from any requirement imposed by education legislation.'' 
That is just the start of it. There is a catalogue of centralisation, new discretions for the Secretary of State and vast, sweeping Henry VIII powers. 
 Consideration of the breadth of the clauses that are scheduled for debate today and until lunch time on Thursday gives rise to real fears that we may not give them adequate attention, given that so much discretion is left in the hands of Ministers. It is vital that the Committee should have an opportunity to draw out from the Minister exactly what he and his colleagues wish to do with the powers that they seek. 
 According to the programme motion, the Committee is expected to have considered chapter 1, which is about powers to facilitate innovation, by Thursday lunch time this week. As I said, we in the Opposition welcome such powers in principle; however, they are very wide, given that they allow the suspension of all education legislation as defined by the Education Act 1996. Chapter 2 deals with what is termed ''earned autonomy''. We must explore how it is earned and why it should be subject to the discretion and opinion of the Secretary of State or the National Assembly for Wales. We must debate the powers to exempt curriculum legislation, pay and conditions and the potential to reintroduce grant-maintained status, which the Government abolished in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998.
 Chapter 3 details sweeping powers to form companies and privatise swathes of local education authority functions, including school provision. Before Christmas, we will be expected to have dealt with the matter of financial assistance-the right of the Secretary of State to disperse funds for ''any educational purposes''. Under a different Secretary of State, those powers could extend to the introduction of education vouchers or credits. These are matters of great concern to all who are interested in education-the powers, role and make-up of governing bodies, the use of schools to provide community facilities, the creation of federations of schools and the resulting change in the character of those schools. That is not an exhaustive list, but it gives a flavour of the enormous range of matters that we are expected to consider by next Tuesday. Under a tight programme motion that limits our ability to explore matters, we will seek to amend the Bill in order to restrain the unfettered powers of the Secretary of State. We will set out a clear process for how autonomy will be earned, and we will seek to remove unnecessary bureaucracy. 
 I do not want to prolong debate, but I accept the programme motion with a fairly heavy heart and great concern for the quality of the Bill. The Committee will not be able to debate adequately or consider all relevant matters in the time allowed. In that context, we will make appropriate progress today. I hope that Ministers will reflect on the importance of the matters at stake, and consider whether we might have a proper length of time to debate the powers at the heart of the Bill.

Phil Willis: I do not want to take up any more of the Committee's time. Yesterday evening, we had ample opportunity to discuss the timetable motion. We could have taken three hours if we had wanted to; we chose to spend 20 minutes. We agreed with you, Mrs. Adams, on what the timetable would be for the first three days of the Committee. We feel strongly about the key issues in the Bill, and frankly, would like to get on with debating them.

Stephen Timms: I welcome you to the Chair, Mrs. Adams. Having guided us safely through the Programming Sub-Committee meeting last night, I look forward to your stewardship of our deliberations.
 In response to the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady), I should say that the Bill is not a centralising one; it is deregulatory and devolutionary. It is ambitious—he is right about that—and we shall discuss in detail how it will free up regulation and encourage innovation. On the basis of what the hon. Gentleman, I am puzzled about some of his amendments because several propose greater powers than the Government think prudent. I will be interested to hear him argue in favour of those amendments later. 
 As the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis) pointed out, we discussed that in the Programming Sub-Committee last night and made some changes to the programme motion to 
 reflect the concerns of the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West. I understood that he was broadly content, given the constraints of the time scale imposed by the House within which the Committee should conclude. We have also made it clear that if there is a need for further variation in the motion during our deliberations over the coming weeks, we will be willing to accommodate the concerns of all members of the Committee as far as we can. 
 Question put and agreed to.

Irene Adams: I remind the Committee that there is a financial resolution in connection with the Bill, copies of which are available in the Room. As a general rule, adequate notice should be given of amendments. I do not intend to call starred amendments, including those that may be reached during the afternoon sitting. I also give members of the Committee advance warning that we will meet in Room 6 on Thursday, as the Northern Ireland Grand Committee, which has a large membership, will be using this Room. We will return to this Room next week.Clause 1 purpose and interpretation of chapter 1

Clause 1 - purpose and interpretation of chapter 1

Phil Willis: I beg to move amendment No. 72, page 1, line 6, at beginning insert—
 'Subject to subsection (1A) below'.

Irene Adams: With this it will be convenient to take amendment No. 73, page 1, line 11, at end insert—
 '(1A) The Secretary of State and the National Assembly of Wales shall, before making an order under section 2 or section 3 with respect to a particular maintained school, consult the local education authority.'.

Phil Willis: I welcome you to the Chair, Mrs. Adams. I have not had the opportunity to work under your stewardship before, but I understand from my hon. Friends that you are a fair and generous Chairman. You are also a most appropriate Chairman for the Bill, because of your long involvement in education. As you represent a Scottish constituency, you are aware of the benefits of devolved power to not only the Scottish Parliament, but Scottish local authorities and schools, and I have no doubt that you will use your wisdom in that direction too.
 I am delighted that you have come to the Committee with an understanding of local government and its uses, as you have served as a member of Paisley town council, Renfrew district council and on Strathclyde regional council—an education authority. When we discuss key issues involving local authorities and the Government's disgraceful attempts to strip them of more powers, I am sure that your ears will prick up and that you will be especially mindful of the arguments. 
 Clause 1 is an important first clause, and it would be difficult to find any other first clause that had such significance. My hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws)—he is not with us this morning as he is serving on a Select Committee—Conservative 
 Members and I have tabled a range of amendments. The purpose of amendments Nos. 72 and 73 is to explore the future role of the local education authority under the Bill, which provides that a school can apply directly to the Secretary of State for exemption from any requirement of education legislation, such as, for example, from the curriculum, which otherwise is not provided for in part 1, chapter 2. Clause 4 does not even require the LEA to be consulted. We seek an assurance from the Minister, if not acceptance of the amendment, that LEAs should automatically be consulted about any school that varies its terms and conditions or the 1996 or 1998 legislation. We cannot understand why that will not be the case. 
 Under section 5 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998, LEAs have a duty to raise standards. I think that some hon. Members present, including the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West, served on the Committee that considered that Bill. It was the first time that such a duty had been imposed on LEAs in law. The 1998 Act was a significant piece of legislation at the time, yet there is a contradiction. The aim of this Bill is to raise standards and facilitate innovation. As I said, LEAs have a responsibility to do exactly that under section 5 of the 1998 Act, but at the same time they will not have control, or even a say, over those schools that have left their control to become grant-maintained—I should not use that term—or super-grants. I should not use that term either, but that is what the schools will be in effect under this legislation. 
 There is very much a feeling of deja vu about part 6, because so much of the legislation is from the former Government, whom we got rid of at the beginning of this Parliament. That part re-provides for a duty on LEAs to ensure that the national curriculum is taught in schools. Under part 1, however, a school can opt out of the national curriculum without asking the LEA for any advice. Indeed, the Secretary of State does not have to consult the LEA at all. 
 However, some of the greatest innovation in the British education system has taken place because of LEAs. I am sure that, from your experience, you can testify to that, Mrs. Adams. In fact, much of the innovation up to the early 1980s was due to the fact that LEAs were in charge of schools and school innovation. It is interesting that in the 35 years after the second world war, only 150 pieces of legislation affecting schools were passed. Since the early 1980s, the number has risen to more than 800. At local level, local authorities are being starved of resources and, indeed, powers to innovate.

Andrew Turner: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that until the early 1980s, it was only narrowly accepted that the education system was failing? From then on, that began to be more widely accepted to the point where this Government have accepted that there are many problems for pupils and their parents. That is why the previous Government and this one have, to their credit, tried to improve the education system.

Phil Willis: I am delighted that the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Turner) immediately nails his colours to the mast by effectively saying that he does not want LEAs to have a role. Indeed, a previous Administration made exactly those claims. In the Tory party's manifesto at the last election, its express policy was to get rid of LEAs, make all schools free and have some 24,000 admissions authorities and organisations running around the country. The Tories are entitled to their vision, but I certainly do not share it, and I take issue with the hon. Gentleman and the assumption that the education system was failing.
 The reality is that today, as 10 or even 30 years ago, parts of the system are delivering a sub-standard product. I can point to schools in my constituency that 10 or 20 years ago were as successful as they are today. In fact, one might even argue that some were more successful. We would find exactly the same situation in every hon. Member's constituency. 
 With the amendment, we are asking the Government about the the role of LEAs. Amendment No. 74 is also a probing amendment. Included in the amendment—

Irene Adams: Order. We are discussing amendments Nos. 72 and 73.

Phil Willis: I am sorry. I was getting very excited and moving on to the second group. We are asking the Government for their opinion about what role the LEA should play in being consulted on the clause.

Graham Brady: I am delighted that the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough has tabled the amendments because they allow us to explore the Government's thinking on the role of the local education authority. It was slightly unfair of the hon. Gentleman to caricature the position of the Conservatives on education at the previous general election As all hon. Members of the Committee know, the free schools policy accepted that some residual roles would remain with local authorities, notably in special educational needs and school transport. It also set out an overarching requirement to provide an appropriate school place for every child.
 It would be interesting and instructive to compare and contrast the Bill, particularly the clauses dealing with innovation and the suspension of education legislation as it applies to certain schools or groups of schools, with the vocal attacks that the Government made on the Conservatives' position on education at the time of the last election. Ministers can considerably circumscribe the powers of local education authorities and we should look at that. 
 If I had tabled the amendment, I would characterise it as a probing one. We must explore what the Government see as the appropriate role of the LEA. The document issued by the Department for Education and Skills, ''The role of the local education authority in school education'' states, at paragraph 11: 
''good schools manage themselves; and that Authorities only intervene in schools' management in inverse proportion to those schools' success''
We have heard that before in regard to the Government's proposed interventions in schools. They have not lived up to it, but we have heard the phrase. It goes on: 
''there are a number of essential functions which cannot and should not be discharged by individual schools. Examples of this are planning the supply of school places for a given area, taking account of population trends and transport patterns across Authority boundaries -often involving contentious decisions about school closures or mergers; making sure that every child has access to a suitable school place, or has suitable provision made for him or her outside mainstream school; intervening in failing schools which have shown themselves incapable of putting their own house in order; and taking decisions in consultation with schools, about the distribution of the schools budget to take account of schools' differing needs.'' 
The document was published in 2000 and is, as far as we can establish, a statement of the Government's current policy and thinking. I would be most interested to hear how the Minister reconciles the statement that those functions cannot and should not be discharged by individual schools with clauses 1 and 2, which make provision for schools to operate in precisely the way that Ministers say they cannot and should not. If the Minister says that the document remains an accurate statement of Ministers' views and that schools cannot and should not discharge those functions, I assume that that means that he will accept the amendment. However, if he refuses to place any restraint on Ministers' powers to allow schools to innovate and to operate without the framework of the local education authority and without the frameworks within which schools today operate, Members on both sides of the Committee will have serious questions about whether the Government really stand by the role of the local education authority, or whether they do so only sometimes. 
 Does the Minister stand by the phrase: 
''there are a number of essential functions which cannot and should not be discharged by individual schools''? 
If they cannot be carried out by individual schools, they cannot be carried out by any individual school. Does the Minister stand by that position, or does he believe that, in some cases where innovation may be restrained by a local education authority, those functions could and should be discharged by individual schools?

Andrew Turner: I should like to probe the Government's motives a little further than my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale, West. I shall try to illustrate the difficulty in which the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough seems to find himself. It arises from the differences between those who want to treat schools as toddlers, those who want to treat schools as teenagers, and those who want to treat schools as grown-ups. The toddler approach adopted by the Liberal Democrats claims that everything in the garden was rosy until approximately 1986 and continues to be--or would have been, had no changes in education been made since then--provided that local education authorities constantly hold schools by the hand.
 The Government's approach is much more progressive. They say, ''We will set a series of boundaries for the teenager: he must be in bed by 6.30 
 pm or 10.30 pm—it obviously depends on the age of the teenager. We shall allow him to drink alcohol in closely-prescribed circumstances, but we, the parents of the teenager—or, in this case, the Secretary of State—know best''. 
 Our approach is that schools are grown-up. They have the right and responsibility to take the decisions that they believe are appropriate in the interests of their pupils' learning and advancement, and of the wider community. The toddler approach is totally out-of-date and discredited, but the Liberal Democrats like to propose it none the less. They suggest that, because so much innovation took place as a result of local authority involvement—I am talking, of course, about England and Wales, not Scotland, about which you, Mrs. Adams, will know much more than I—that innovation is now closed off. I see no evidence in my local education authority of innovation being closed off because of legislation passed since 1986. I see no reason why local education authorities should be given a role additional to that provided in the Education Reform Act 1988 in deciding the kind of innovation individual schools should attempt to introduce. 
 The Government's approach is more progressive because they understand that innovation in schools is necessary, but they want to constrain the boundaries heavily. They do not really trust schools, just as sometimes we do not really trust teenagers. They do not want them out on a motorbike late at night; they do not want schools taking decisions for themselves unless the Secretary of State is looking over their shoulder and keeping what they are doing closely in mind. That is the difference between the Government and the Liberal Democrats. The Government's approach is for teenagers, and the Liberal Democrats want to treat schools as toddlers. It is far more appropriate to treat schools as grown ups, with the reserve power of intervention for special cases where the adults cannot look after themselves.

Chris Grayling: I just want to say a few words, further to the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight and the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough.
 The degree to which we entrust schools with greater responsibility for managing their own affairs is the fundamental heart of the debate and, for me, the question is how we achieve that. My anxiety about many elements of the Bill, which is replicated in some early provisions, is that we are once again asking head teachers and governing bodies to take on a raft of additional tasks to bring themselves to the point at which they can apply for the new status. Having spoken to teachers about the work load problem that they face, I am anxious that the Bill only makes that problem much worse. It was striking that on Second Reading, the Secretary of State had nothing to say about teachers' work load.
 I am anxious also about the implications of a process that requires schools to put together a substantial application, which involves a huge amount of work, and to approach the Secretary of State to seek a new status. If we were to overlay on to that the process suggested by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough, which is for schools to go through that process with their local education authority as well, that would provide an unwanted and unnecessary burden of bureaucracy with which schools can ill-afford to cope. The benefit of the free schools approach taken in the Conservative general election manifesto is that it offers them the ability to take responsibility for their own affairs without making them jump through hoops. My big concern is that we expect schools to take on an enormous burden of work to enable them to reach the point at which the Secretary of State can make a decision. We should bear that in mind as we debate the clauses and amendments. It should be a given in Committee that, if a proposal means a raft of additional work for schools, we should think hard before accepting it.

Graham Brady: My hon. Friend makes an important point. Does he agree that the approach taken by the Bill—giving wide enabling powers rather than specifying the criteria under which innovation will be permitted or promoted—adds to that burden? Schools will not be able to look at a clear objective set of criteria on which they will be granted the right to innovate. Instead, they will find themselves making a bid that will be awarded or rejected on the whim of the Secretary of State.

Chris Grayling: My hon. Friend makes an important point, and schools are rightly concerned about the degree to which guidelines will evolve over time. One of the most persistent complaints from the education world is that nothing is ever given time to bed down. If the Secretary of State is given swingeing powers to decide the criteria to determine whether a school is allowed to be innovative, will we be certain that those criteria will not change after six, 12 or 18 months as the process develops?
 I agree with my hon. Friend that more detail should be attached to the provisions. One of the most profoundly concerning aspects of the Bill is the vagueness of its stipulations. There is no detail. The Bill basically says that the Secretary of State will decide everything and we are just enabling her to do that. I am concerned about the Bill's potential for exacerbating the work load, and I am uncomfortable with the Liberal Democrat amendment because we are creating a process that over-engineers for schools and makes the lives of heads and teachers more difficult.

Stephen Timms: We have had an interesting discussion around the two amendments, including some diversity of views among Conservative Members, and between them and the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough.
 I shall respond to the matters raised and make a couple of general points at the outset. First, the Bill's clear focus is on raising standards of education, which reflects the Government's highest priority, expressed 
 by the Prime Minister before the 1997 election, of education, education, education. During our debates, I shall encourage the Committee to resist attempts to shift that focus elsewhere and to keep tightly to raising standards. 
 Secondly, as a result of changes in the past three or four years, the education service is accountable. Targets have been set throughout the system, performance tables are published and there are Ofsted inspections. Everyone knows their schools' and local education authority's objectives. As a consequence, one of the great benefits is that we can give a much freer reign to the professional judgment of teachers and head teachers about precisely how to achieve their objectives and raise standards in their schools, in an adult way, as the hon. Member for Isle of Wight colourfully suggested. The Bill will permit teachers to be the leaders in the next wave of education reform; it is about deregulation and devolution. 
 I make no bones about my third introductory point: we want more education measures to be passed through secondary legislation than has traditionally been the case. Education measures have been out of step with other legislation, and thus have been unnecessarily inflexible and unduly prescriptive. The Committee will discuss the many instances in which greater flexibility would help to meet the different circumstances of communities throughout the country and to support the different needs of schools.

Graham Brady: I am grateful to the Minister for giving way on that vital matter. I am most anxious about the drift—the Minister says that it is a deliberate policy— away from primary legislation, which is properly scrutinised and debated, to secondary legislation, which may go through the House without debate or in a Committee whose timetable is constrained. In justifying the policy, the Minister said that education legislation is always out of step, but education legislation was presented every year in his Government's first term.
 I made my maiden speech in 1997 on the legislation introduced to abolish the assisted places scheme. In 1998, I served on the Committee on the School Standards and Framework Bill. The following year, there was a teaching and higher education Bill, and the year after that I sat on the Committee considering the Learning and Skills Bill. The Government have introduced legislation on education every year; how can it possibly be out of step?

Stephen Timms: I am referring to the period before that. A large chunk of our debate will be about the formulation for the national curriculum in the Bill, which is very different from that enacted by the previous Government. The tradition was for a large amount of detail in primary legislation, which means that changes could not be made except through new primary legislation. That was unnecessarily unhelpful and inflexible. I accept that there will be questions about how parliamentary scrutiny can be properly exercised; we shall no doubt spend a fair time in Committee reflecting on that matter, and it is right that
 we should do so. However, I make no apology for wanting to introduce more flexibility to the operation of education legislation than was available in the past.

Andrew Turner: Does the Minister accept that, certainly in the terms in which it was re-enacted in the 1996 Act, the national curriculum is one example of exactly what the Minister proposes? It is prescribed only in broad terms by the Act, but in detail by order of the Secretary of State. Section 356(2) of the 1996 Act states that the Secretary of State may, by order, specify the attainment targets, programmes of study and assessment arrangements that he considers appropriate. That is exactly the kind of clause that he proposes for the whole range of measures in the Bill. The national curriculum therefore seems a poor example for him to have drawn upon. The rest of the 1996 Act, on the whole, devolved specified powers to schools so that they knew where they were.

Irene Adams: Order. Hon. Members are wandering a bit. There will be opportunities later to debate this matter. The Committee should stick to discussing local authorities at the moment.

Stephen Timms: Mindful of your point, Mrs. Adams, let me simply say that part 6 of the Bill sets out again the arrangements for the national curriculum, and part 7 does so for Wales. We shall certainly have a full discussion about those matters when we reach those parts of the Bill.
 The amendments deal with the role of local education authorities. I am a former local authority leader. I have a background in local government, as do you, Mrs. Adams, and some Committee members, and I take a high view of the role of local authorities in education. The Government's view is the one set out in the documents that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West quoted. It is an important and significant role. It is not simply making arrangements around the periphery, as the Conservative party did, although I am not sure that it still wants to do that. It is a central role with a responsibility for school improvement. 
 We envisage a different role for local education authorities. In the past, LEAs delivered a wide range of activities, and did so exclusively. In the future, we see them facilitating and co-ordinating delivery by a number of partners as well as themselves. We have made it clear that we do not intend to change their central role in school improvement. Indeed, a few weeks ago I was with a group of LEA chief officers, who rightly pointed out that there is now a new consensus about the role of LEAs. We are not fighting boundary wars. The position is clear and the central focus is on responsibility for school improvement and a number of other matters that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West read out from the document. 
 The proposals in the Bill are certainly not intended to centralise power in the hands of the Secretary of State. Chapter 1 contains a power for the Secretary of State to respond to innovative proposals put forward by schools and LEAs. That important point has not 
 been picked up in any of the contributions from Opposition Members. The LEA may itself be the applicant for those powers.

Graham Brady: Before the Minister moves from the central question of the role of the LEA, particular in relation to school improvement but also in all the other areas that I enumerated, can he guarantee that the powers contained in part 1 of the Bill, when applied to a school and allowing it to innovate and be exempt from education legislation, will not interfere with the role of the LEA? Will the LEA have exactly the same powers and role in relation to a school that has been granted an arrangement of innovation under the Bill as it has in relation to other schools in the neighbourhood?

Stephen Timms: No, LEAs will not have exactly the same role in dealing with different schools. We made the point, which the hon. Gentleman repeated, that we believe in the principle of intervention in inverse proportion to success. I would expect the LEA to play a bigger role with schools that are struggling than with successful schools.
Mr. Brady rose—

Stephen Timms: Let me continue, as that brings me back to a point that the hon. Gentleman made earlier. The power would not give schools the duties of an LEA, such as ensuring the supply of a sufficient number of school places. That would have nothing to do with raising standards, which is clearly set out as the purpose of the clause. The relationship between LEAs and different schools will depend on their circumstances.
 The Bill provides that applicants--it may be LEAs or schools--will make proposals following consultation, in accordance with guidance from the Secretary of State or the National Assembly. That is spelt out in clause 4, subsections (1) and (2) of which are particularly important, given our current debate. That is consistent with our approach of supporting innovation, generated at the grass roots and involving all the relevant parties. The Secretary of State will make an informed decision based on information provided by the applicant, which will include the outcome of consultation with local bodies. 
 Where a school, as opposed to an LEA, applies to the Secretary of State, we expect the consultation to include the LEA. The guidance issued under clause 4(2) will make that clear, which may help the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough. The LEA itself could be the applicant, so the amendment does not entirely make sense, although I understand the point behind it.

Chris Grayling: I seek clarification. If a school was seeking to make an application to the Secretary of State, partly because its relations with the LEA were bad and it was unable to achieve what it wanted within the confines of the local LEA structure, would the fact
 that it was in conflict with its LEA and did not have its backing affect the nature of the Secretary of State's decision?

Stephen Timms: Clause 4(2) states that ''the qualifying body''—in that case the school—
''shall consult such persons as appear to the body to be appropriate, having regard to any guidance''. 
As I said, under the terms of the guidance, consultation will include the LEA. The results of the consultation, including the LEA's comments, will be provided to the Secretary of State under clause 4(1). That information would be in front of the Secretary of State when she makes her decision.

Graham Brady: I fear that the Minister is tying himself in knots to some extent. He said that the LEA would be consulted and that the Secretary of State would be under no obligation to follow the LEA's recommendations. In a sedentary intervention while my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) was speaking, the hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) said that that was the whole point. If the provisions enable a good school to escape from a bad LEA, I would remind him that he said that intervention would be in inverse proportion to success. That implies choice and discretion on the part of the LEA. If a school has applied for innovation status to escape from a failing LEA, will that LEA retain powers to intervene in the school's performance and activities?

Stephen Timms: The hon. Gentleman misrepresents the clause. Clearly, the purpose of clause 1(1) is to raise educational standards. Undoubtedly, schools will choose to make such applications in a variety of circumstances. In doing so, they will need to consult several bodies—including the LEA—and the result of that consultation will be available to the Secretary of State when she makes her decision. The hon. Gentleman is putting a rather different character on the clause. I urge him not to divert us from the clear focus of the Bill: raising educational standards.

Andrew Turner: The Minister speaks as if the Bill refers to only one jurisdiction. Although he can assure us on behalf of his right hon. Friend and her successors in the post of Secretary of State for Education, he can give no such assurances on behalf of the National Assembly for Wales. Is the Minister speaking for the Welsh Assembly in his assurances? If not, can the Assembly draft entirely different guidance that may forbid the consulting of LEAs or the involvement of diocesan authorities? That is my reading of clause 4(2).

Stephen Timms: That is an interesting line of discussion. I am sure that we will have similar discussions several times during the proceedings, which is why I am glad that the Under-Secretary for Wales, my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig), is on the Committee. The National Assembly for Wales will engage in extensive consultation with local authorities on all such matters, and it will undoubtedly want to do so in the manner set out by guidance. He should be reassured on that point.

Andrew Turner: I really cannot see how the Minister can give any reassurances about the future political complexion or judgment of the National Assembly for Wales. He is holding the electors of Wales in contempt if he assumes that he can give assurances on their behalf.

Stephen Timms: I can draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to the published statements and intentions of the National Assembly of Wales.

Andrew Turner: Current.

Stephen Timms: Yes, but similarly I can give assurances only on behalf of the current Secretary of State; I cannot bind future Secretaries of State.
 The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West said that, had he moved the amendment, it would have been as a probing amendment. I think that he has moved it: it is very similar to amendment No. 6, to which we shall come shortly.

Graham Brady: That refers to a different clause.

Stephen Timms: It does, but its purpose is close to the current amendment. I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell raise the subject of free schools. Government Members will be interested to understand the Conservative party's precise position on that subject. Not long ago, the Conservatives' only apparent schools policy was one in favour of free schools. In this context, ''free'' meant free from the shackles of local authority control, so it was startling to see the reference to democratic accountability of schools in the motion moved by Opposition Members on Second Reading.
Mr. Brady rose—

Stephen Timms: I shall give way in a moment. We have not heard much from Conservative Members on that issue for a long time. The motion did not give the impression that it is still their policy to promote free schools and to cast off the constraints imposed by local authorities, and we would welcome clarification.

Graham Brady: Does the Minister believe that the only way in which a school can be democratically accountable to parents and the local community is through an LEA?

Stephen Timms: The motion clearly implied that democratic accountability can be achieved through local authorities, and there is much merit in that view. It will be even more interesting to Government Members if the Opposition propose a new mechanism for democratic accountability of schools that does not involve local authorities, and we look forward to hearing more about that in the Committee.

Chris Grayling: The Minister will be aware that, over the years, the Conservative party has believed consistently that we should entrust head teachers and governing bodies with more powers. It is not for me—a new member of the Committee—to talk about party
 policy, but I strongly believe that what is missing from the Bill is the ability to give powers to head teachers and governing bodies.
 Let me give the Minister a practical example. The Bill provides entirely for successful schools, but a great success of the grant-maintained school system was to give freedoms to schools that had underperformed so that they could turn themselves around and become successful. That is completely missing from the Bill.

Stephen Timms: Like the hon. Gentleman, I would like to know his party's policy on that issue and I hope that we shall be informed of it during the debate. His point about work load was raised on Second Reading, and teachers and head teachers share his concern. As proceedings continue, we shall see that several parts directly address that issue and allow us to make major strides in dealing with it in the way in which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State set out in her lecture to the Social Market Foundation a few weeks ago.
 As several hon. Members pointed out in helpful sedentary interventions, it is important to stress that the process is voluntary for schools, LEAs and qualifying bodies. They can apply if they feel that that is in the interests of raising standards in their school or area. We are not imposing the process on anyone, and I assure the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell that many schools will want to apply for the freedom provided by part 6. That will, of course, involve them in additional work and planning, but many schools will want to take up the opportunity because they can see the value of using the measures to raise standards.

Graham Brady: The Minister clearly believes that many head teachers and governing bodies will seek to take advantage of the provision. How many LEAs does he believe will do so, and does he believe that the provision will be popular with them?

Stephen Timms: I certainly expect to see applications from LEAs.

Phil Willis: The debate has been interesting, especially in the light of Conservative Members' admissions that they have no education policy at all. That is a starting point for the future, if nothing else. I am delighted that the Minister has accepted the main principle behind the amendment, which is to consult, and is not as the hon. Member for Isle of Wight described it.
 Consultation is anathema to the Conservative party. The assertion that democratic responsibility and accountability and the Conservative party go hand in hand is a contradiction in terms. We have heard it today and we shall certainly hear it in future debates. We want to establish the consultation of local education authorities, not to return to the bad old days when the local authority was the provider of all services as a monopoly supplier. We accept that those days have gone and that modern local authorities see themselves as enabling bodies to raise standards in schools.
 However, we reject the view of the Conservatives and, increasingly, the Government, that what happens to one school does not have an impact on another in the same area. The purpose of consulting the local education authority, which is at present the only democratically elected local body, is to ensure that one man's riches do not create another child's poverty. That is what happened with grant-maintained schools: the principle was established that local authorities were not consulted. There was a direct relationship between a group of parents and a ballot, the fractured management of the school and the Secretary of State.

Andrew Turner: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Phil Willis: Let me make this point before the hon. Gentleman gets too excited. What happened with many grant-maintained schools—Conservative Members who were in government at the time should remember this well—created great problems locally in terms of admissions and the disproportionate use of resources. The amendment attempts to address that impact. Although we would have preferred to see it in the Bill, we are grateful that the Minister has conceded that, in regulation, both here and in clause 4, it will be made a condition that local education authorities have to be consulted. With that assurance, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
 Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Phil Willis: I beg to move amendment No. 74, in page 1, line 6, after ''to'', insert ''promote and''.

Irene Adams: With this it will be convenient to take the following amendments: No. 40, in page 1, line 8, leave out
'in the opinion of the Secretary of State,'.
 No. 75, in page 1, line 9, after ''standards'', insert ''or childcare provision''. 
 No. 76, in page 1, line 9, after ''standards'', insert 
''and the improvement of special educational provision''.
 No. 77, in page 1, line 9, after ''standards'', insert 
''and the improvement of social inclusion''.
 No. 1, in page 1, line 9, after ''England'', insert 
''; there shall be a presumption in favour of innovation except where the Secretary of State has reasonable grounds to prevent it''.
 No. 31, in page 1, line 9, after ''England'', insert 
''and promoting equality of opportunity''.
 No. 78, in page 1, line 9, after ''England'', insert 
''or the development of schools in their communities''.
 No. 2, in page 1, line 11, after ''Wales'', insert 
''; there shall be a presumption in favour of innovation except where the National Assembly for Wales has reasonable grounds to prevent it''.
 No. 32, in page 1, line 11, after ''Wales'', insert 
''and promoting equality of opportunity''.
 No. 3, in page 1, line 12, at end insert— 
 ''(2A) In subsection (1) 'innovation' means any change from existing practice in a particular school, educational institution or part thereof''.

Phil Willis: I expected the first group of amendments to receive the Minister's assurance within about five minutes so that we could move on, because this group concerns the substance of the clause. I hope that we can have a massive debate on the principles at stake.
 Amendment No. 74 moves on from some of the Minister's comments on the last group of amendments. Hansard will show that he emphasised that he wanted to see the promotion of innovation, not simply its facilitation. He also made the point, which Labour Members supported, as I did, that local education authorities could apply to innovate in order to raise standards. We would like to see in the Bill the words ''to promote'' as well as ''to facilitate''. To promote is a proactive activity; to facilitate is passive. Does the Minister accept that, for both qualifying bodies and schools, our system has consistently prided itself on the promotion of innovation and we would like to see it take place again? 
 The amendment also raises the cost of innovation. Although cost is mentioned in the explanatory notes, it is unclear where the additional resources to promote--or, indeed, to facilitate--innovation will come from. 
 Amendment No. 74 examines the issue of promotion but also raises the question of funding for innovation and whether additional resources will come from the standards fund or from the new funding stream that will result from changes to the standard spending assessments and the funding of local authorities and schools. Where does the Minister expect the resources to come from to promote and to facilitate innovation? At present, the only resources available are special Government grants to specific schools. There must be resources to support the initiative if there is to be wide-scale acceptance by schools and local authorities. 
 Amendment No. 40 is, perhaps, the most important that the Liberal Democrats propose in this sitting. It seeks to remove from clause 1(1) the words 
''in the opinion of the Secretary of State''.
 I hope that Conservative Members will support the principle of what we are trying to achieve, because it is a key issue. Before we leave the clause, we require answers from the Minister to three questions. First, can he explain what ''earned autonomy'' means? It goes to the heart of what the Government seek to do. Secondly, can he define ''a successful school''? Thirdly, can he define ''a failing school''? Those three terms are used constantly. They were used on Second Reading and have been used by the Prime Minister and various Education Secretaries and Ministers throughout the lifetime of this Labour Government. It is important that we put the meaning of those terms on the record, either in the Bill or in the regulations.

Stephen Timms: The hon. Gentleman is jumping ahead by addressing points that will be raised under clauses 5 and 6 and onward. Those are the earned autonomy, not power to innovate, sections.

Phil Willis: I am perfectly happy for the Minister to reply that he will answer my questions when we discuss those clauses. However, within our discussion of the
 group of amendments—particularly amendment No. 40— I am trying to wrap up the essence of what the Government seek to achieve in facilitating innovation, and the Liberal Democrat response to it. The two go together.
 The Minister must tell us why the Secretary of State alone should have such powers. Why do they fall within her remit? If the Government believe, as I do, that the vast majority of schools throughout the country perform well, why should we not assume that all schools and LEAs should have those powers, unless there is a good reason for them not to have them? That is at the heart of our discussion. Ofsted says that an increasing number of schools and LEAs are performing well and that some of the problems in LEAs seem to have been rooted out. If that is so, why do we not allow them those powers, subject to certain qualifications? For example, a school under special measures or even a school that is showing serious signs of weakness could not take up those powers. 
 There is a fundamental difference between the Secretary of State, who is saying that she must have control of the whole process—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Don Valley rightly says that I do not believe in a national system of education, but she does. With respect, if the Government want a centrally directed and centrally controlled education system in which everyone dances to the same tune, they should be honest enough to say so. If the Government want to achieve that, they can. They have such a system in France and in other countries, but I do not believe that we should have that here. With your experience in Scotland, Mrs. Adams, I am sure that you will have seen different education systems that reflect local conditions. The same applies in Northern Ireland and in Wales, as the Under-Secretary, the hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig) will attest.

Chris Grayling: I should be grateful if the hon. Gentleman would clarify that point. His party has talked in the past about significant government devolution within England. Would he prefer different education systems in different parts of England, too?

Phil Willis: The hon. Gentleman knows that the Liberal Democrat party is in favour of regionalisation. The population of the area where I live and work in Yorkshire and the Humber is exactly the same size as that of Scotland. Therefore we see no reason why Yorkshire and the Humber should not have the same powers as Scotland to innovate, disapply tuition fees and give quality care to the elderly. The hon. Gentleman and his party do not share that view, but it is entirely legitimate and we can debate it.
 I fundamentally disagree with the Government's idea—the Bill is a classic example—that they should take more and more powers to the centre and use them in whatever way they wish, with secondary legislation and regulation, irrespective of the views of the House and areas of England. That idea should be challenged, and the Minister should respond to that.

Andrew Turner: I confess that I am a little puzzled as to where the hon. Gentleman and his party stand on this issue. He has criticised grant-maintained
 schools and our free schools proposals, yet he has welcomed the measures that the Government are introducing that will give greater discretion to individual schools, and he wants to prevent the Secretary of State from deciding whether that discretion should be devolved to schools.
 The hon. Gentleman has made it clear that he believes in greater powers for schools, but he does not believe in the Secretary of State having a role in deciding which powers should be given to schools. He wants clarity in the Bill, so why is he talking about regional systems, when it might be better if the decisions were made, say, on the Isle of Wight and not in Woking?

Phil Willis: With the greatest respect, I wish that the hon. Gentleman would follow the debate. I was responding to a reasonable question in a legitimate intervention from one of his colleagues. Perhaps I should not take interventions, because if I do, I get into trouble for responding to it.

Andrew Turner: It is the way the hon. Gentleman responds.

Phil Willis: It's the way I tell them—but we shall not go into that.
 On Second Reading, I asked the Secretary of State to give the Committee the definitions of a successful school and a failing school. I remember having an exchange with the hon. Member for Bury, North (Mr. Chaytor), with whom I enjoy debating, about the definition of a failing school. I went back to a definition that was given in a Department for Education and Skills press release of 1 March 2000, which referred to 
 ''The new benchmark—with no school having fewer than 25 per cent. of its pupils gaining 5 good GCSE passes''. 
Schools that did not meet that benchmark would have special measures applied to them, including being teamed up with a beacon school, being introduced into fresh start or bringing in super heads. All those issues were raised after 1 March 2000. 
 In an article in The Times on 5 September, when the White Paper was introduced, the Prime Minister said: 
 ''Our best schools are outstanding, but 480 schools—one in seven of the total—secure five good GCSEs for fewer than a quarter of their pupils. This is unacceptable.'' 
He did not qualify or include a rider to that statement about schools' performance. While some Opposition Members may accept that definition, I and other hon. Members do not. I am sure that the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), who has worked in some demanding schools in his time, would also accept that that extremely narrow definition of a failing school is unacceptable. It is therefore important to ask whether we should have such a definition. 
 Amendments Nos. 75, 76, 77 and 78 follow a pattern. They seek to broaden the definition of innovation and success. At present, all that can be varied for schools is the national curriculum and the terms, conditions and levels of pay for staff. If that is the Government's total vision for secondary schools 
 and the future of secondary education, God help us. The amendments would extend innovation into other key areas. I hope that the Minister will accept that the Government must envisage far wider discretion for innovation. 
 Amendment No. 75 would include innovatory child care projects within the scope of the powers given to schools. The Minister and the hon. Member for Don Valley would be the first to accept that child care and early years education are crucial in raising standards. Indeed, all hon. Members would surely accept that. Many years ago I worked as the head of a major secondary school. We had the power to run our own daycare centre in the school, and did some experimental work with Leeds university and the Institute of Education in that regard. The amendment would encourage innovative approaches to our schools, rather than applying these measures just to the curriculum and working conditions. Clauses 25 and 26 may provide schools with sufficient scope to innovate in other ways. If so, I would accept the Minister's view on the matter. 
 Amendment No. 76 deals with the improvement of special education provision. The link between raising educational standards and developing new special education provision can be difficult. Our survey of 240 so-called challenging schools showed that one of the problems that many of them face, especially in our inner cities, is the significant rise in the number of children with special educational needs in deprived areas. I think that the Minister would accept that. It is often the schools with the greatest challenges in raising standards, whatever that means, that also face communities of youngsters with other special needs that must be addressed. For example, two additional children with special educational needs can distort the performance of a small primary school. One of the most exciting aspects of the Bill is that it will allow some secondary schools to act differently. On Second Reading, I tried unsuccessfully to talk about my sadness that the schools with those difficulties that need to innovate the most, because they are not successful on the Government's terms, will be denied the ability to do so. 
 The point behind our amendments is that, if we gave all schools these powers, we would enable those that face more challenging circumstances, particularly in special educational needs, to use more exciting methods. The Minister will know that I spend much of my time working with integration projects for children with special needs in different circumstances. When we were operating in Leeds, we became a centre of excellence, particularly for children with severe learning difficulties. We attracted a significant population of those children, and it was a great sadness that they had an adverse effect on our examination performance, on which we were judged. I say that they had an adverse effect, but they also had an enlightening effect on our school. Nothing in the Bill would enable that school to operate in an exciting way, and the Minister must address that.
 Amendment No. 77 deals with social inclusion projects. The purpose is to find out whether the powers in the Bill would be sufficient to allow a school to run its own pupil referral unit.

Chris Grayling: I am grappling to understand the difference between the hon. Gentleman's position and that of the Conservative party. My colleagues and I have argued for giving schools more broad-ranging powers and the freedom to decide their own fate and how they operate, instead of the convoluted process of limited engineering, controlled tightly by the Secretary of State, that allows only a select few to have some powers. We want schools to take the decisions that concern them and benefit their pupils, and I am at a loss to understand the difference between our positions, as we both want much greater freedom for schools.

Phil Willis: I accept the hon. Gentleman's point, and there are two responses. Some of us lived through the grant-maintained saga—[Interruption.] With respect to the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs. Laing), it was not a success, but an absolute debacle. It created massive divisions in our education system.

Eleanor Laing: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Phil Willis: I will just finish my point. I am glad that I have roused the hon. Lady.
 The grant-maintained saga created huge divisions in the system. Approximately 1,000 schools became grant maintained and, in doing so, took resources from other schools in the area, as that was the way that the system worked. Those schools did an enormous amount of cherry picking of students, which had a skewed effect on the exam results of most local authorities.

Eleanor Laing: I was officially asking the hon. Gentleman to give way because I should not have made my comment from a sedentary position. Now that he has given way, I should just like to point out that he and many Labour Members are obsessed with divisions in education, instead of paying attention to raising standards, which the Bill purports to be about. Grant-maintained schools raised standards enormously in certain places, but not in every area because not all schools became grant maintained. Grant-maintained schools worked exceptionally well, to the enormous benefit of hundreds of thousands of people.

Phil Willis: I do not wish to cast aspersions on the achievements of grant-maintained schools, many of which achieved a great deal. I am delighted at the success of any school, but I reject the view that giving one school virtually all an authority's capital budget and increasing its funding by about another 17 per cent. should be regarded as equity. It was the inequity of that system that had to be—
Several hon. Members rose—

Phil Willis: I suggest, Mrs. Adams, that we are straying from my point.

Irene Adams: Order. I remind hon. Members to keep to the subject of the debate.

Phil Willis: The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell asked a serious question about the difference between what we propose and the Bill as drafted. I want all schools to be able to innovate, not just those picked by the Secretary of State. I did not want grant-maintained schools to get additional resources and to innovate, as the Tory Govt proposed, but nor do I want a complete free for all, which is what the Conservative party is suggesting with their free schools. Conservative Members fail to acknowledge the fact that the £540 extra that the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) said, during the last general election, he would give to every pupil was the £540 that local authorities retained for central services, which was ludicrous. Of course we want a framework and consultation; what happens to one school has an effect on another. It is important to work co-operatively rather than individually, and amendment No. 77 considers social exclusion. That issue and educational standards are one and the same; sometimes social exclusion must be dealt with before policies to raise standards can be developed.
 We do not want a repeat of what happened when the Conservative Government introduced city technology colleges and CTC trusts, which were supposed to take students from the local catchment area, with a proper distribution of intake to reflect the locality. Dixon city technology college in Bradford has such an intake, as I am happy to report, having visited it recently. However, elsewhere, from Gateshead to Lewisham, CTCs have made fishing expeditions beyond their boundaries to attract children from outside the locality.

Andrew Turner: Will the hon. Gentleman give way.

Phil Willis: Well—

Andrew Turner: I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way; I apologise for taking advantage of his apparent indecision.
 If the hon. Gentleman would stop perpetrating myths about what happened between 1988 and 1997, we would find it easier to rely on what he says about Liberal Democrat policy. In a previous debate, I described his hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Mr. Sanders) as an elephant on a tightrope, striving not to fall on the side of Conservative or Govt policy. The hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough is slightly more elegant than the elephant, but he is still wandering all over the place, which is a dangerous thing to do when one is on a tightrope. It is almost impossible to tell which powers he thinks should remain with the local education authority and which should, as of right, be given to the school. Will the hon. Gentleman please clarify the matter?

Phil Willis: The hon. Gentleman uses graphic language. He paints a vivid picture of an elephant on a tightrope; was it a toddler, or—

Andrew Turner: The hon. Member for Torbay.

Phil Willis: The amendments explore one of the Bill's core issues. Does the Minister accept that all schools, other than those subject to special measures or showing serious signs of weakness, should be given the powers? Should they be given on the same basis to local education authorities? I hope that would satisfy Conservative Members because it would cut out a huge amount of bureaucracy; there would be an assumption in favour of innovation rather than simply control by the Secretary of State. Will the Secretary of State include in the Bill or in regulation definitions of a successful or a failing school? Does he accept that innovation other than in terms of the curriculum and pay and conditions is what is needed to give schools and local authorities real powers to innovate?

Graham Brady: These important and challenging amendments, which have wide implications, are at the core of the clause, as the hon. Gentleman said. I want to comment briefly on his amendments before speaking to amendments Nos. 1, 2 and 3.
 Amendment No. 74, which would encourage the promotion of innovation, challenges the Government to probe the depth and reality of their commitment to innovation and to an explosion of new ideas and practices in schools in a drive to raise standards, and how far they merely mouth the words. I look forward to the Minister's response. 
 Amendment No. 40 echoes my amendment No. 9 to clause 5. It considers how far Ministers should be trusted to exercise their discretion. The present Minister and Secretary of State have huge integrity and great good will; we may often disagree with them about how to improve school standards, but we are also acutely aware that holders of the office of Secretary of State for Education and Skills change regularly. For the Bill to have a principal criterion that such an important decision is to be the opinion of whoever happens to be Secretary of State is a worrying power to leave with Ministers. 
 I have considerable sympathy with the first two amendments in the group. On amendments Nos. 75 to 77, 31, 78 and 32, there is an interesting difference of approach between two of the amendments and the rest. I wonder whether the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough might enlighten the Committee as to his thinking in phrasing amendments Nos. 31 and 32 differently from the others. The other amendments begin with the word ''or'', which implies that, if they were included in the Bill, it would be a matter of choice as to whether the innovation in question would be to improve educational standards, child care provision, special education needs provision, social inclusion or the development of schools. It will not have escaped the attention of hon. Members, even those who are busy with their Christmas cards, that amendments Nos. 31 and 32 begin with the word ''and'', which implies that, were the amendments to be passed, it would be a requirement in England and in Wales that innovation should not only improve standards but promote equality of opportunity. I do not know 
 whether the hon. Gentleman would care to enlighten me now or later, but that important question must be answered.

Phil Willis: I would not have thought that any member of the Committee would require an explanation. It is a fundamental principle of our party and of education that we should promote equality of opportunity for all our citizens. It is as simple as that.

Graham Brady: I wanted to establish whether the difference in phrasing was deliberate, and I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for pointing out that it is. However, it has important implications. The importance that the hon. Gentleman ascribes to the subject matter of his other amendments is not as great as the importance of promoting equality of opportunity, which would place a requirement on the Secretary of State. The other amendments would simply set out parameters within which judgments could be taken.
 It would be useful to explore the inclusion in amendments Nos. 31 and 32 of the requirement that any innovation should promote equality of opportunity. The hon. Gentleman says that it is a fundamental tenet of his party. I suspect that all hon. Members, regardless of the party of which they are a member, would share the view that equality of opportunity is vital. It is what drove many of us to become involved in politics and public life. I do not think that there will be a gap between hon. Members of any party on that question. 
 However, historically, there has been a huge void as to how it is best achieved. For instance, we shall consider the status of grammar schools and selection later on in our discussions. The hon. Gentleman and I have debated that in Committees on numerous occasions. The newspapers on Friday and this morning announced—before announcements were made in the House—that the Government have changed their approach to grammar schools. They now embrace them and see them as a way to spread best practice and bring special skills to other schools in the maintained sector. Those of us who have had the privilege of representing selective education systems have seen that in practice for many years. We perceive a difference of approach. The Conservative party has traditionally defended the remaining grammar schools, often under repeated attack from Labour Members. However, it is now joined by the Government in viewing grammar schools as promoting equality of opportunity. I know that the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough takes a different view.

Phil Willis: We have always exchanged views robustly on that subject. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, in view of the Minister's statement last Friday—sadly, we did not hear it on Second Reading—clauses 104 to 109 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 now have to be removed? Clearly, it is impossible to marry the Minister's comments about extending the role of grammar
 schools with the flawed ballot system that purports to get rid of them, although the hon. Gentleman and I would disagree on that.

Graham Brady: We have always agreed that the ballot system is flawed. I think that the threshold was set too low, whereas the hon. Gentleman thinks that it was set too high. It will be interesting to see if the Minister tables amendments to reflect the Government's new-found love of grammar schools. We will want to explore that, but I raise the point to illustrate the difference of approach. If we were to include a requirement to promote equality of opportunity in the Bill without defining that phrase, it would raise concern. I wait for the Minister's reassurance on how the Government will ensure that equality of opportunity is maintained.
 To save time, I will speak to amendments Nos. 1 and 2 together. Their wording is the same. The only difference is that one applies to England, and the other to Wales. I am conscious that the question is sensitive because amendment No. 2 would circumscribe the freedom allowed to the National Assembly of Wales. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Wales may want to comment on that. 
 The amendments are designed to examine the Government's commitment to innovation. Is it akin to the Government's commitment to end selection, which—even if we have read the Minister's lips—may be reversed? Is it similar to their pledge to promote the establishment of faith schools to raise standards, which is quietly moved away from as time passes and controversy arises? Are the Government of the view that the best way to raise standards in schools is to release the energy of teachers, head teachers, governors and non-teaching staff in maintained schools? If the Government really believe that that is the best approach, the Minister knows that it is risky. It means that Ministers have to do what they are least inclined to do: stand back and let people get on with their jobs. Taking that risk means that the innovation will be more successful in some instances than in others. It is not a recipe for uniformity. Quite the contrary, it is potentially a recipe for huge diversity if Ministers are brave and bold enough to grasp the nettle and to see innovation springing up across the maintained schools system. 
 This is a slightly difficult group of amendments to speak to because it also embraces amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough, which in some ways seek to constrain the form or the type of innovation. [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman is looking a little concerned. He does not interpret it in that way. However, by specifying what types of innovation would be allowed rather than leaving it in its present fairly broad terms, he is in one sense seeking to constrain the application of the Bill. My amendments Nos. 1, 2 and 3 are entirely permissive. They seek to further innovation, to remove restrictions and to prevent Ministers from exercising discretion in such a way as to prevent an innovative proposal when they do not have good reason to do so.
 Amendments Nos. 1 and 2 will really get to the heart of what Ministers perceive as being important in the freedom of innovation in part 1 of the Bill. Are they comfortable to be faced with a requirement to allow innovation unless there is an impediment? If they are, they will accept the amendment. If the Government promise to table their own amendment, perhaps on Report, to strengthen the presumption in favour of innovation, I would be prepared to withdraw mine. If they insist on opposing the amendments, it will cast real doubt over the strength of their commitment to and belief in innovation. We await the Minister's views with interest. 
 Finally, amendment No. 3. Even though I seek to add a little to the definition of ''innovation'', I do so in what I hope is a helpful and permissive manner. The amendment specifies that 
'''innovation' means any change from existing practice in a particular school, educational institution or part thereof.'' 
The purpose is first to draw out from the Minister how he sees the measure being used in practice. Does he have particular projects or types of projects that he feels that his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State would look upon favourably? Does he believe that there are limits to what is acceptable innovation? Does he believe that innovation must be something that has not been done or tried before? 
 My amendment would clearly allow a school to adopt practices that had been tried before and which perhaps had been found to be successful and worthwhile and had contributed to improving education standards in our schools in the past. Whole class teaching, phonics, and the way in which schools balance whole class and group techniques might be characterised as traditional teaching methods. A few years ago, those methods were highly contentious, but increasingly they are the stuff of consensus. The traditional approach to education has been taken to good effect in Scotland, as my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mrs. Laing) repeatedly reminds me in discussions on education policy. In some schools, traditional teaching methods would be an innovation. In some areas, they may, sadly, be rare, but could raise educational standards for an enormous number of children. That is the core purpose of amendment No. 3. 
 I do not want to detain the Committee any longer, but stress that 
''presumption in favour of innovation'' 
in amendment No. 1 goes to the heart of what the Government say that they are seeking to do. If they are not prepared to support a presumption in favour of innovation, my hon. Friends and I will have profound cause to doubt the sincerity of the Government's commitment to it. I invite the Minister to support the amendment or give robust assurances that the Government will amend the Bill to similar effect.

Caroline Flint: I want to make a few comments, as my name has been mentioned during the debate.
 The Government have been criticised for the number of initiatives that they have introduced, but no one could doubt that, since 1997, they have striven to 
 create opportunities for all those involved in education—teachers, governors, LEAs or even politicians with an interest in education—to improve the ways in which we motivate our children and young people to learn. The norms that I expected when I was at school many years ago are different to those that are faced by children in many of the communities that I represent. Communities were often held together by the work that was offered, such as mining, which gelled the approaches of those communities to education and to the law. That cohesion has broken down over many decades, and we are trying to recreate it. That is why I believe so passionately that we should not treat schools as islands. 
 Some years ago in the Education and Employment Committee, on which I served with the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough, the point was made repeatedly that schools cannot operate on the basis that children come in at 9 am and leave at 3.30 pm, and they can have a detached attitude to what happens during their waking hours outside school. We argued for schools to be able to use their budgets more creatively, whether individually or with other schools in their communities, and we considered the use of non-educational resources. That view comes out in the tone of the Bill. 
 I want to discuss devolution, the powers of schools to get on with the job, innovation, and the role of the state. Politicians of all parties talk about the power to choose, but I must say as a mum, as well as a Member of Parliament, that many parents have little choice about where their children go to school. It is usually the school that is on their doorstep and in their community, because if they go to work they have to get their kids to school first. Other factors also affect their child's education. Many people do not have the means to pay their way out of that situation by going to live in a leafy suburb or paying for schools outside the maintained system. That is why it is so important that our education policy on driving up standards is aimed at every school in every community. It is also why parents need a safety net. They need to know that the buck stops somewhere, and that someone is making informed choices. By having a Department responsible for education and a Secretary of State to represent it, Governments of all shades of opinion have recognised that, because taxpayers' money is used, the Government of the day should drive the agenda on standards and should decide how that money will be distributed. 
 I was in a beacon primary school a few weeks ago, and teachers said that they referred to one section of their money as Blunkett money, because they defined it as money with which they could do what the hell they wanted. [Interruption.] Hang on a minute. Opposition Members are saying that schools cannot spend the money as they wish. I suggest that schools have and will continue to have more autonomy over how they spend their money than ever before. That slices through many parts of the Bill.

Chris Grayling: Will the hon. Lady give way?

Caroline Flint: No, I will finish my point.
 Schools have more autonomy and more ways to innovate. I refer to the Education and Employment Committee report on the role of head teachers. We found that good head teachers and local education authorities were innovative in many different ways. However, that is not always the case, and there must be a balance between devolution and elected politicians taking responsibility for driving the education agenda.

David Miliband: Does my hon. Friend agree that the Opposition are not drawing a stark enough contrast between innovation that goes on daily in schools throughout the country to develop education fit for the children in the individual school, and innovation that breaches national terms and conditions or the national curriculum? There are a multitude of practices under the single word ''innovation'', and it is important to distinguish properly between them.

Caroline Flint: I agree. Innovation is not the property of any one person or group; it has many forms. The Bill is trying to grasp the fact that, at a certain level, it is impossible for schools or other partners, such as the LEA, to take part in some innovative projects. One issue that I will be interested in is examining the scope of the national curriculum, particularly at 14 plus.
 The Bill is all about motivating children to learn.

Chris Grayling: The hon. Lady was talking about the freedom that schools have to spend money. I was pinching myself as she spoke, because I had a conversation no more than two weeks ago with a head teacher who expressed frustration about how little control she had over the money that came to her school. She said that she spends endless hours chasing after little ring-fenced budgets that are not suitable for the needs of her school, and that drives her up the wall. How do her experiences relate to the hon. Lady's? The real world in which the head teacher is working is very different to the one that the hon. Lady mentioned.

Caroline Flint: I agree with the hon. Gentleman on one point: funding takes many forms. Some still goes through the LEA and is passported on to schools. The Government have made huge efforts—with Labour LEAs as well as others—to ensure that that money is passported on to schools. There are other sorts of funding. For example, a ward in my constituency is considering having a mini education action zone. Hon. Members may say that it should have the money anyway, and we could debate that, but the fact is that schools can bid for and receive money from the pots for education action zones and other innovations, whereas they could not do that before. That is part of the educational contract under which the Government are committed to driving up standards. The Bill provides that resources will be released to allow teachers the freedom to use innovative methods if they are clearly linked to raising educational standards.
 I want to make a point about the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough. As he knows, I take a great interest in child care. During the summer recess, I spoke at a number of conferences throughout the country about child care and the education White Paper. There is great optimism in the child care sector that the Bill will enable governors to expand their role in community provision. Early years partnerships will enable schools to have more freedom to innovate in that area and to consider issues around the concept of the extended school. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that the child care sector has picked up on that, which is why his amendment is not necessary. I think that his point is covered elsewhere, as are some of his other amendments. 
 In my area, the bottom line is how we raise educational standards. The issue is about those who could achieve much more than they do; the need to ensure a better educational environment for those in the middle of the group; and the achievement of those who, for whatever reason, are socially excluded and need extra support or different ways of learning to enhance their motivation and their enjoyment of education. 
 It is important that we do not dilute the Bill's opening lines and the core principle of raising educational standards. I am not saying that the hon. Gentleman intends to do that, but I feel sure that his point will be covered elsewhere in the Bill and that the measure's application will become clearer as we proceed.

Chris Grayling: I shall start by picking up on the final comments of the hon. Member for Don Valley. There is no division in the Committee or the House about the desirability of raising educational standards; the division is about how we reach that point. My great fear about the tone set in the initial clauses is that the Bill seeks to raise standards by over-engineering the education system. As I shall keep saying until I am blue in the face, the consequence is that we shall give undue amounts of work to heads and teachers, making it much more difficult for them to deliver day-to-day quality teaching.
 Again, I hark back to a conversation that I had with a primary school head, this time in my constituency, who said, ''What I really want to do is teach. I want to get out of my office and into the classroom to work with some of the kids in the school. The trouble is that so much stuff is coming from central Government that I don't have time to do that.'' My fear is that the process of innovation only through a prescribed route decided and vetted by the Secretary of State will simply add to the complexity of the ''stuff'' with which our head teachers have to deal.

David Miliband: The hon. Gentleman has made two sets of interventions this morning. On the one hand, he made an important point about burdens on teachers and the priority that should be attached to getting them teaching. On the other hand, he argued for greater devolution to schools of various
 responsibilities that LEAs currently discharge. How does he square that circle? He wants to allow teachers to teach, but he also wants them to get into the business of planning and goodness knows what else, which local authorities currently do for them.

Chris Grayling: I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has ever served as a school governor, but if he has, he will have much experience of the amount of unnecessary paperwork that comes out of LEAs, of the number of reports that must be completed for LEAs and of the amount of reporting back that must be done for LEAs. If we add to that the constant stream of initiatives from central Government—a primary school governor recently told me that she had six to deal with by the end of January—it amounts to an enormous and intolerable burden on schools.
 I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale, West on his amendment. We approve wholeheartedly of innovation, but it should not be a question of the Secretary of State saying, ''If you do what I tell you, you can be free to do what you want.'' That is a contradiction in terms. The presumption should be that schools will be given greater freedom to innovate, to understand and appreciate the character of their pupils and their areas, and to respond to those needs. The whole process should be one of pushing responsibilities down the line rather than schools being required to demonstrate that they are somehow a cut above the rest so that they can enter a selection process in which the Secretary of State decides whether they will get extra freedoms.

James Purnell: Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that the freedom he proposes is a large one? If it were adopted, schools could opt out of the whole of the national curriculum and the whole national pay and conditions framework, without any reference to Government.

Chris Grayling: I have tabled an amendment to a later clause that addresses the hon. Gentleman's point about the national curriculum. The teaching profession and the Government will eventually have to address the issue of national pay and conditions, given the huge difficulties of finding teaching staff in south-east England. The cost of living in some parts of the country is vastly different from that in other parts and we shall have to address that in looking at the framework for pay and conditions in schools. The presumption that innovation is a good thing and that schools should have the ability to innovate with relative freedom rather than having to go through a complex and difficult qualification process must be the best approach.
 The hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough said that some elements of the grant-maintained school system did not work as well as they should. The whole foundation of grant-maintained schools was democratic, with local parents deciding whether schools became grant maintained. In many cases, unfortunately, it became a political rather than an educational battle. If the hon. Gentleman is correct in his assertions, he will surely agree that it cannot be 
 right to allow only some schools to innovate. Grant-maintained schools delivered excellent quality, but the fact that not all schools were grant-maintained made it more difficult for those changes to be seen across the board. Similarly, the system advocated in this Bill, whereby only a select number of schools have the right to apply to be innovative, cannot be the best way forward. The presumption should surely be that every school should be given the flexibility to innovate, unless there are compelling reasons, such as special measures, not to do so. 
 To set limitations will inevitably mean that the best-run schools with governing bodies that have the time, professional skills and ability to go through a complicated application process—probably the schools that were grant-maintained and that are now foundation schools—will benefit. There is no mechanism in the Bill that would give struggling inner-city schools that are beginning to turn themselves around the freedom to innovate. The measure will simply allow the best schools, which always emerge at the top of the pile, to do so again. To give all schools the freedom to innovate must be a better approach than simply putting limitations on what is happening. 
 I want to make one point on the issue of child care, in response to the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough; I shall return to the issue as our debate progresses. I have serious anxieties about the way in which we regulate the pre-school sector. As the hon. Member for Don Valley knows, because I raised the point in the House last week, I am anxious about the amount of regulation that we impose on what should still be a relatively informal developmental environment. We are far too prescriptive and elements of the Bill continue that process. 
 I would feel profoundly uncomfortable about supporting the amendment of the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough, not because I am in any way unsupportive of child care, early years education or nursery provision but because that sector is being sucked into the educational mainstream in legislative terms and is being subjected to too many of the norms applied to secondary and primary schools. As that process develops, not only are many of those groups being driven out of business, but the people who run them find it far more difficult to do the job that many of them do so well. That is why I am profoundly uncomfortable about bracketing child care provision with an Education Bill that is fundamentally targeted at the older years of education.

Stephen O'Brien: To reinforce my hon. Friend's point on early years provision, when I was a member of the sub-Committee of the Select Committee, we took evidence on those matters. It would be helpful to direct all Committee members to the evidence sessions in that inquiry. While the report came out broadly—with some reservations—in favour of prescribing training for all those concerned with child care, a considerable amount of evidence placed a higher value on parents and the community in the earlier years, which are increasingly overlooked. I hope that the evidence sessions will inform the
 Committee's considerations on not being over-prescriptive, particularly regarding early years provision.

Chris Grayling: I thank my hon. Friend for that information. It reinforces my view that we should not allow the Bill to continue the process of over-formalising early years provision. We must get it absolutely right and find the best balance between an informal environment and developmental facets. The balance is not right in this country at present and I do not want the Bill to make the imbalance even greater.
 It must be the correct approach to give schools the right to innovate as a matter of course. That right should be removed only where there are compelling educational reasons for doing so. The balance is wrong in the Bill. I commend my hon. Friend's amendment.

Eleanor Laing: My hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale, West has already spoken to the amendment tabled in his name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury, and I do not wish to waste the Committee's time in reiterating his points. I would like to probe a little further on amendments Nos. 75 and 76, which were eloquently presented by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough. I would not necessarily have suggested that the matters referred to in amendments Nos. 75 and 76 should appear at the beginning of the Bill, but as the hon. Gentleman has made that suggestion, I would like the Minister's assurance that special educational needs and child care appear at the beginning of the Government's draft of the Bill. If they are not, I would not take it as an indication from the Minister that those are not considered extremely important subjects. They are indeed extremely important and the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough is right to have raised them at this point in our deliberations.
 Amendment No. 75 deals with child care. Will the Minister assure us that the Government do not consider child care to be merely some sort of by-product--an added extra--of education? Does he agree that the care of small children is the beginning of their education? Thankfully, in most families the duties of early child care and, therefore, the beginnings of education are undertaken by parents or grandparents, in the community or in the family. However, families in some areas of the country are less fortunate and, in those cases, providing early years care and therefore education gives small children the best start in life. 
 I appreciate the comments of the hon. Member for Don Valley. She is chairman of the all-party child care group, of which I am vice-chairman. That does not mean that we entirely agree on all of the issues, but I know that she gives this matter high priority—indeed, she said as much this morning—and so do I. 
 I seek the Minister's assurance that we are not to assume that the Government do not give the matter high priority simply because it does not appear near 
 the beginning of the Bill. I look forward to examining the issue later in part 9. I hope that we will have more time then to explore the Government's plans. 
 Likewise, I wish to probe further on amendment No. 76, which also was eloquently proposed by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough. The issue of special educational needs is not being handled properly and is causing chaos in some parts of the country. Some education authorities simply cannot cope with requests for statementing. Many families cannot deal with the long wait between requesting a statement for a child and the exploration and granting of one. 
 The theory of inclusion for children with special educational needs works well in some cases, but is a complete disaster in others. Recently, special educational needs has been seen as a single problem, but it is far from that. There is an enormous range of needs. A slight inability to read because of dyslexia, for example, is simple to deal with by inclusion in the main stream. A child may need an extra hour or so each week or some minor assistance. However, at the other end of the spectrum are conditions such as Asperger's syndrome, which is serious and often not detected until a child is past the age at which something might be done to help him or her. To suggest that small children with Asperger's syndrome should be treated in the same way as children with mild dyslexia, by inclusion in the main stream, is to treat the problem as less serious than it is. It is an increasingly serious problem. 
 Inclusion does not always work, and the disruption of mainstream classrooms by children with serious problems that should be dealt with in another way is becoming a problem. Let us make no bones about it: the education of other children in classes in which children with severe learning difficulties are included is being affected. 
 The amendment contains many implications for the budgets of schools and LEAs, and for the work loads of teachers and teaching and care assistants. Most importantly, there are enormous implications for the foundation of children's learning ability. I shall not take up more of the Committee's time on the issue now, but I hope that we will have plenty of time to discuss it in parts 6 and 10 of the Bill in a few weeks' time. I seek the Minister's assurance that, just because the Government have not put special needs in the first clause of the Bill, it does not mean that they do not give the issue high priority.

Stephen Timms: I welcome the discussion. A valuable conclusion to be drawn from it is that both sides of the Committee support innovation and the possibility that becomes a reality. I welcome the fact that the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough spoke about promoting, rather than simply facilitating, innovation, because some people may say that there are dangers here. It is helpful that the whole Committee supports innovation. My hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley reminds us that the Select Committee unanimously supported similar measures over an extended period. It is helpful to know that unanimity exists on this matter.
 Adding the words ''promote and'' would not help: if anything, it would slightly hinder. However, I welcome the spirit of what the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough said. 
 The two routes to innovation in the Bill have caused confusion. At the moment, we are debating powers to facilitate innovation. I emphasise that any school can apply to exercise the powers under chapter 1. That is not the case with the powers set out in chapter 2, familiarly known as ''earned autonomy'' and described here as 
''exemptions related to school performance''. 
When we consider that provision, we shall examine which schools will qualify for exemptions because that is related to their performance, and the criteria for performance. Those issues do not arise in chapter 1. 
 At face value, some Opposition Members appeared to suggest that anybody should be able to change the law without reference to Parliament. Opposition Members cannot really support that proposition. It is vital that a process is gone through if the law is to be changed in the way that applicants propose. In passing, I note that schools that wanted to become grant maintained also had to apply to the Secretary of State. 
 It is misleading for Opposition Members to suggest that the provisions are unduly bureaucratic. I emphasise that any school can apply for the power to innovate. A weak school may have a partnership proposal to work with a good school, which could be approved under the Bill. Some Opposition Members assumed that those powers would not be available for weak schools. It is an important aspect of the Bill that those schools will be able to apply for them.

Graham Brady: The Minister makes an interesting comparison with the Secretary of State's past role in grant-maintained status applications. A school in a constituency adjacent to mine had a parental ballot in favour of GM status. There was no educational reason why the school should not move to GM status, but the 1997 general election intervened between the application and the Secretary of State's approval. The parents of that school were denied their will because the Secretary of State exercised an opinion that was not based on educational grounds. That could be avoided by requiring the Secretary of State to have good reason to veto a proposal.

Stephen Timms: Conservative Members are in a small minority in lamenting the passing of grant-maintained schools. The last Conservative Government may have said no in certain circumstances, even if there was a ballot in favour. However, there was a process of application to the Secretary of State in that instance. If that point establishes that Conservative Members accept the need for an application to the Secretary of State, we have made some progress.
 Amendment No. 40 proposes leaving out the words, 
''in the opinion of the Secretary of State'', 
but the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough would accept that a judgment must be made about whether a decision raises standards. The Secretary of State would take advice on that, but 
 ultimately, only a Minister of the Crown or the Welsh Assembly can make a parliamentary order to change the law. 
 The amendments raise important issues about equality of opportunity and special education provision, which the hon. Member for Epping Forest also mentioned. In passing, let me point out, perhaps pedantically, that the amendments put the issue of the improvement of social inclusion into the wrong part of the clause, but I shall not dwell on that. It is worth being clear that we would consider the full effects of any proposal, and that if those issues were damaged, the Secretary of State would not conclude that the proposal would raise standards.

Chris Grayling: Will the Minister give way?

Stephen Timms: In view of the time, I shall not give way, as I need to make progress.
 I can assure the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West that if the Secretary of State is satisfied that a proposal will contribute to raising standards, she will permit it. In judging whether standards are raised, she will consider, for example, the impact on the provision for special educational needs. I hope that that also helps the hon. Member for Epping Forest. 
 We do not propose that there should be innovation for innovation's sake, which amendments Nos. 1 and 2 would create. The intention behind the Bill is to raise educational standards. My hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley made the important point that we must continue to focus tightly on raising those standards, because that has such a big impact on social inclusion later in life. 
 On the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough, the Secretary of State will judge the proposals, and she would rightly be cautious about seeking to extend her powers to make determinations over a wider range of activities. As has been pointed out, many of the initiatives, including extended schools, the ability to provide child care in schools and the ability to contribute 
''to the development of schools in their communities'' 
—to use the wording in amendment No. 78—are provided for elsewhere in the Bill. I draw hon. Members' attention especially to clauses 25 and 26, which have been mentioned. 
 We want head teachers and governing bodies to make proposals, which we expect to be varied and to contribute to the wider community. We do not want to constrain innovation by seeking to define it tightly or by introducing prescriptions that would make it more vulnerable to judicial review or would create a charter for lawyers, as I believe amendment No. 3 would do. It is neither possible nor practical to require the Secretary of State to set a measurable test by which those proposals can be judged.

Stephen O'Brien: Will the Minister give way?

Stephen Timms: I apologise, but I do not think that I can.
 The key test would be whether the proposal would contribute to the raising of educational standards. We believe that, given the clear accountability framework, 
 we can be much less prescriptive than has been typical, and can therefore unleash creativity in schools so that teachers can lead the next wave of education reform. 
 There was some comment on last week's announcement about grammar non-selective partnerships. The Green Paper—published on 12 February—was clear about those partnerships. It stated: 
 ''We want to encourage more partnerships between grammar schools and secondary moderns in the future so that they can share expertise and learn from each other . . . We will provide additional funding to encourage this collaboration and in due course to extend it to all selective areas.'' 
Last week, I gave details about how that commitment has been implemented.

Stephen O'Brien: I had hoped that the Minister might feel it appropriate to give way, as we could have dealt with the point more briefly than he has.
 On his objection to amendment No. 3, I was struck by his concern that it was a charter for lawyers, although I have no reason to declare an interest as a solicitor who ceased practising 14 years ago. With regard to amendment No. 1 and consequential amendment No. 2 on Wales, I am concerned that the word ''innovation'' encompasses innovations of different types, as the exchange between the hon. Members for Don Valley and for South Shields showed. 
 Although the Minister prays in aid that the focus must be on raising standards, there is no clarification of the various meanings of the word ''innovation'' in the Bill. Without amendments Nos. 1 and 2, and especially amendment No. 3, there would appear to be a much greater danger that the Bill would become a charter for lawyers and that many schools would be disappointed under part 1. 
It being One o'clock, The Chairman adjourned the Committee without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order. 
 Adjourned till this day at half-past Four o'clock.